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Saturday, 22 December 2012

Before
the antibiotic era syphilis was one of the most feared diseases on the planet.
Now of course a dose of penicillin is enough to cure an infection. Yet as the
author notes, syphilis still persists even though it has not become resistant
to antibiotics, although the worst it can do is rarely seen in the modern age.
After reading this book I’m grateful to be living in the antibiotic era (the
right side of 1945). Pox tells the story of many famous men and women who suffered
from syphilis and the mercury ‘cures’ that were almost worse than the disease
itself. The blurb on the dust jacket also promised to reveal the extent of
syphilis’s influence on art, achievement and thought since the fifteenth
century, something that influenced my decision to read the book.

It’s
easy to see syphilis as the New World’s ultimate revenge for its brutal
colonization by European powers. The first major historical figure examined is
Christopher Columbus, who was almost certainly one of the first syphilitic
Europeans. Europeans introduced a multitude of new diseases into the native
populations of the New World, but the one they brought back with them would
curse Europe for centuries to come. When Columbus and his men sailed back into
Spain in 1493 the syphilis plague began soon after, with the first major outbreak
in Naples in 1495.

The
intriguing case of Columbus and his men is just the first of many. In
chronological order the supposed syphilitic lives of such historical figures as
Beethoven, Schubert, Abraham Lincoln, Vincent van Gogh, Nietzsche, Oscar Wilde,
James Joyce and Adolf Hitler are examined. It makes for a disturbing yet
fascinating read.

Hayden
is a quality writer, described as an “independent scholar” on the inside of the
dust jacket; she manages to avoid the academic solipsism that can ruin some
non-fiction. The short introductionary piece called Cactus Flower – Portrait of
a Syphilitic, creatively reveals what it would have been like before the
anti-biotic era to contract syphilis – the horror, the desperation, the futile
attempts to find a cure and the crippling need for secrecy. During the course
of the book the nefarious power of the disease is revealed; the initial
infection, the often long secondary phase in which syphilis mimics many other
diseases and finally the tertiary phase of euphoria and insanity. It’s the last
phase that elicits the most fascination and makes you wonder about what kind of
symbiotic relationship the spirochete has had with these important historical
figures.

Ludwig
van Beethoven is a fascinating case. Although is it not absolutely certain that
he had syphilis, the evidence is strong. His deafness, rages, cardiac
arrhythmias (something he apparently set to music – piano sonata opus 81a les
adieux) and general ill health could all be attributed to syphilis. Hayden
notes that Beethoven was often seen “wildly stomping” around the streets of
Vienna during the last years of his life with hair flying and looking like a
tramp – behavior that can be attributed to tertiary syphilis.

Less
certain though, is the matter of Beethoven’s musical genius. Could his creative
powers be ascribed in part to the influence of the syphilitic spirochete? The
same question can be asked about van Gough’s intense paintings. What about Oscar
Wilde’s beautiful writing and mordant wit, or James Joyce’s groundbreaking
prose? Initially Pox does seem to promise answers, but in fact Hayden skirts
around trying to establish such a premise and mainly concentrates on
establishing whether these individuals did in fact have syphilis. Pox is basically an
academic retrospective detective story featuring some of history’s most
influential characters. It’s fascinating stuff, but not as controversial as it
initially promises to be. However it doesn’t take much consideration to come to
the conclusion that if Hayden had attempted to establish that some of history’s
greatest creative minds had owed their inspiration to the syphilis spirochete,
then she would have left herself open to severe criticism.

Hayden
ends her gallery of syphilitics with Adolf Hitler, which ironically makes the
question of syphilis’s influence more pressing. Hayden reveals Hitler as having
all the hallmarks of syphilis and examines the theory that a Jewish prostitute
possibly infected Hitler when he was a young man. The evidence Hayden presents
is certainly compelling. What does this mean regarding how we think about the
Holocaust and WWII itself? Would the holocaust had of eventuated if Hitler had
not made a fateful visit to a prostitute? If antibiotics had been invented just
a few decades earlier would the worst of WWII have been avoided? Of course it’s
far more complex than that, but overall Hayden leaves the reader with much to
consider, including a new macabre respect for syphilis and its almost symbiotic
relationship with those it infects.

Monday, 3 December 2012

Was
it a coincidence that I had to abandon reading Pox, a book about syphilis
and how it influenced certain historical figures, at the chapter about Hitler
so I could begin White Noise in time for my book club? Most likely, but somehow
I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was significant that White Noise’s protagonist - Jack
Gadney, happened to be a professor of Hitler studies. It was also just the kind
of trivial coincidence that is elevated to profound significance throughout the
novel. Jack and his academic colleague - Murray, would have been suitably
impressed and pondered its meaning over many paragraphs.

DeLillo
is considered to be a significant postmodern novelist, and White Noise is his most postmodern
novel. The book touches on almost every significant postmodern concept
available to literature and this is undoubtedly the key to understanding the
novel. White Noise utilizes meta concepts, hyperreality, irony, parody,
deconstruction, media saturation, cultural fragmentation and the nefarious
influence of high capitalism on culture. The novel could also very well be a
parody of postmodernism itself (I strongly suspect that this is the case). White
Noise
is also an extremely funny book and perhaps a bit too clever for its own good,
which in this case is a good thing. Perhaps it is pretentious, but personally I
love a good dose of pretension.

The
Gadney clan sits at the centre of the narrative, a fragmented family of
children from three or more different marriages. The children are, for much of
the time, more adult than Jack and his blonde bombshell wife - Babette. Their
son - Heinrich, is a fast-talking deconstructionalist who argues with Jack
about whether the rain outside the car actually exists, particularly if the radio
has stated that it wasn’t going to rain. DeLillo uses the Gladney family as a
means to explore both the decline of the traditional family unit and the lack
of certainty that comes with it. Jack Gladney neurotically searches for meaning
in a modern world in which meaning is constantly shifting.

In
the first of three titled sections - Waves and Radiation, Jack discovers that
Babette is secretly taking a mysterious drug. Both Jack and Babette also suffer
from a profound fear of death. The adult Gadneys are obsessed with death and
the many new ways of dying that the modern world has manifested all around
them. They argue over who will not cope the most if the other dies, but
meanwhile they take great pleasure in watching disaster footage on television, totally
divorced from the reality of what they are witnessing.

Hyperreality,
in which simulations of reality are mistaken for the real thing, is a concept
that dominates White Noise. Babette reads absurd pulp magazine articles to the blind
and no one questions their validity. In the second section - The Air-Born Toxic
Event, the disaster management organisation called SIMUVAC regards the real
disaster merely as good preparation for the future simulations they plan. When
they do carry out a successful disaster simulation that features noxious gas,
there is an actual noxious gas cloud the very next day, but no one responds
because it doesn’t seem real.

The
dubious truths presented by the media also feature prominently, with Babette’s
addiction to talkback radio and the frequent non-sequitur interactions from the
TV that masquerade as mystical messages.Murray only seems to talk in theories, deconstructing the world whilst
also negating it with his hyperreal academic argot. Murray is also obsessed
with the plain packaging isle at the supermarket, which are hyperreal versions
of ‘real’ food. In many ways Murray is the most significant character in White
Noise
– he is a bullshit artist and genuine at the same time, like a personification
of postmodernism.

Perhaps
the most entertaining aspect of White Noise is the parody of academia. Jack
is the professor of Hitler studies, but can’t speak German. Murray is trying to
establish himself as professor of Elvis studies. The meaning of “Hitler’s
achievements” (as Jack un-ironically states) is subverted into meaningless pop
academia in a superb scene in which Jack trades off comparisons between the two
figures with Murray in a lecture that ends with the two being mobbed by the
students, as if they themselves were rock stars. Jack’s fellow academics also
argue frequently about trivial cultural experiences and act like petulant
teenagers, rather than serious academics.

There
is so much crammed into this amazing book that a lengthy essay is needed just
to begin to address its significance. DeLillo playfully parodies academia, but
at the same time he wrote the perfect book to be studied by English Literature
students. This is how I first came to read White Noise and now having read it
for the third time I remain just as impressed. If you decide to read White
Noise
you’ll find out what Dylar is, why Jack and Babette covert baby Wilder’s
company, the significance of atheist nuns and why it’s always a good idea to
have a full tank of fuel in the car in case of air-born toxic events. Out of
all the DeLillo novels I’ve read, White Noise is his most fully realized. If
you read just one DeLillo novel, make it this one.

Synopsis

This blog is a project designed to help improve my writing skills and to provide a record of what I have read over the years. Hopefully it will also be a resource for those curious about literature. I mostly read literary fiction, cult books, non fiction and science fiction. I also run book clubs at Subiaco Public Library, where I’ve worked happily amongst the books for the last 10 years; so some of the books I review have been selected by my book club members, which helps introduce me to authors I might normally ignore. I have also completed a B.A. in literature at U.W.A. Also you’ll find no links to online bookstores on this blog. I love bookstores and I encourage everyone to support them.